About this ebook
The story unfolds through the author's response to American Indian Movement leader Russell Means' assertion that Europeans, including Marxists, had proved themselves unable to respect nature and the earth. Richards chronicles his own journey growing up as a red diaper baby in Oakland, California and a radical student in the 1960s. From there he traveled through a decades long struggle which led to his discovery of the Goddess. With his growing awareness of the creative female source of life, he explores the hidden story of her suppression inside the ancient origin myths of patriarchy — inside Greek mythology and the one-God Bible. Along the way he examines “Where Marx and Engels Went Wrong.”
Was there a time when our white ancestors lived in harmony with nature? How far back would we have to go to find such a time, if it ever existed at all? How did we lose respect for the natural world and for women? The answers to these questions opens the door to finding a way to change the course of history.
About the author
Paul David Richards was born in San Francisco, California in 1944 to working class parents, grew up in Oakland across the Bay. He attended Verde Valley School in Sedona Arizona where he rode horses and visited Mexico and the Indian reservations of the area. Entering the University of California in Berkeley in 1961, he became immersed in the student civil rights and peace movements, spent two month in jail for protesting racist hiring practices of bay area businesses, resisted the draft and opposed the war in Vietnam. He fled to Ghana, West Africa, briefly in 1966 to avoid the draft, returning after two months to face the jail sentences for past sit-in arrests. He flew from Paris and landed in San Francisco County Jail. Soon after, he moved to Madison Wisconsin, 1967-1971, where he earned a PhD in economic history specializing in economic history. Within a short time he left teaching to become a carpenter and spent 30 years in the building trades.
His father, Harvey Richards, handed him his 22 films and thousands of still photos in 1987 at the end of Harvey's 30 year career as a photographer. Paul compiled some of his father's photos in a book, Critical Focus, and established Estuary Press to publish it and to license and archive the photo collection.
Upon retiring from construction in 2011, he began collaboration with his wife, Nina Serrano, as an independent publisher at Estuary Press. He published Heart Suite, a trilogy of poetry books collecting Nina's poetry written from 1969 to 2012. He created website for Estuary Press, estuarypress.com, which included ninaserrano.com and the Harvey Richards Media Archive. He also created a YouTube channel for video previews of Harvey Richards' films.
Estuary Press is dedicated to Peace, Justice and a Healthy Planet. Paul Richards has two children by his first wife, Susan Alland, and is the grandfather of five beautiful grand children.
